Global Flags

Global Flags

These flags are available on all commands:

Flag	Short	Description
--conf		Custom config file path
--format	-f	Output format: table, simple, detailed, json
--org	-o	Organization name (overrides config default)
--help	-h	Help for the command

Output Formats

NDCLI supports four output formats that can be set globally or per-command:

Table (default for lists)

ndcli device list -f table

Human-readable tabular format, ideal for terminal viewing.

Simple

ndcli device list -f simple

Compact bullet-point format for quick scanning.

Detailed

ndcli device describe my-device -f detailed

Unicode box drawing with the full set of fields for the resource. This is the default format.

JSON

ndcli device list -f json

Machine-readable JSON output for scripting and automation.

Setting Default Format

You can set your preferred default format in the configuration:

ndcli config set output detailed

Or override per-command using the -f flag.

Errors

A failed command exits non-zero and prints its error on standard error, so standard output stays free of it. When the server gave the failure a code, the code leads the message in square brackets:

Error: [SNIPPET_UUID_IN_USE] 'uuid' is already used by snippet 'web-servers' in this organization; omit it and NetDefense generates one

With -f json (or json as your default format), the error is a JSON document on standard error instead. code is left out when the server sent none:

{
  "error": {
    "code": "SNIPPET_UUID_IN_USE",
    "message": "'uuid' is already used by snippet 'web-servers' in this organization; omit it and NetDefense generates one"
  }
}

The per-device lines of sync apply and device approve-all carry the same [CODE] prefix. The MCP server reports the same code and message as error.code and error.message.